Intel's canceled Meteor Lake Desktop CPUs allegedly used repurposed dies from the Meteor Lake-P (MTL-P) laptop lineup.
Intel Meteor Lake-S Desktop CPUs Canned, Entry-Level SKUs Used Meteor Lake-P Laptop Dies
There are multiple reports which suggest that Intel has more or less canceled its 14th Gen Meteor Lake desktop CPUs which were expected to land sometime later this year or in early 2024. There's no explanation for why that happened but it looks like Intel will be offering a refresh of its Raptor Lake CPUs later this year.
Now according to @OneRaichu, it looks like the canceled Meteor Lake-S CPU die won't be going to complete waste. It is stated that Meteor Lake-S still exists and uses a variant of the Meteor Lake-P Laptop die. The Meteor Lake-P lineup is the laptop family so it looks like a certain die was used to make way into the desktop family.
https://twitter.com/OneRaichu/status/1627899433865338880
However, this die won't be like those high-core count Alder Lake-HX and Raptor Lake-HX SKUs but instead, be a standard 6+8 configuration which is what the Meteor Lake lineup was supposed to be before its desktop cancellation.
A block diagram of the repurposed Meteor Lake-S CPU shows that instead of being a monolithic design, the chip will now be cut into various tiles including CPU, SOC, IO, and GT1 (GPU). The GT1 GPU will be making use of a Xe architecture with 64 Execution Units. It also looks like these MTL-S CPUs were going to be positioned in the mid to low-end segment. The following Meteor Lake-S SKUs were supposed to be featured in the desktop lineup:
- Meteor Lake-S 22 (6P + 16E) / 4 Xe Cores / 125W TDP
- Meteor Lake-S 22 (6P + 16E) / 4 Xe Cores / 65W TDP
- Meteor Lake-S 22 (6P + 16E) / 4 Xe Cores / 35W TDP
- Meteor Lake-S 14 (6P + 8E) / 4 Xe Cores / 65WTDP
- Meteor Lake-S 14 (6P + 8E) / 4 Xe Cores / 35WTDP
Intel's Meteor Lake CPUs for mobile platforms including laptops are expected to bring up to 50% performance per watt improvement and while the specific SKU mentioned in this lineup has GT1 (96 EUs) iGPU, the full version is said to feature a 128 EU die with almost twice the performance as last generation. Intel reaffirmed during its recent earnings call that the company will ramp up the production of its Meteor Lake CPUs in 2H 2023 so expect more news later this year.
Intel Mobility CPU Lineup:
| CPU Family | Panther Lake | Lunar Lake | Arrow Lake | Meteor Lake | Raptor Lake | Alder Lake |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Process Node (CPU Tile) | Intel 18A | TSMC N3B | TSMC N3B | Intel 4 | Intel 7 | Intel 7 |
| Process Node (GPU Tile) | TSMC N3E / Intel 3 | TSMC N3B | TSMC 5nm | TSMC 5nm | Intel 7 | Intel 7 |
| CPU Architecture | Hybrid | Hybrid (Dual-Core) | Hybrid (Triple-Core) | Hybrid (Triple-Core) | Hybrid (Dual-Core) | Hybrid (Dual-Core) |
| P-Core Architecture | Cougar Cove | Lion Cove | Lion Cove | Redwood Cove | Raptor Cove | Golden Cove |
| E-Core Architecture | Darkmont | N/A | Skymont | Crestmont | Gracemont | Gracemont |
| LP E-Core Architecture (SOC) | Darkmont | Skymont | Crestmont | Crestmont | N/A | N/A |
| Top Configuration (Compute Tile) | 4+8 (H-Series) | 4+4 (MX Series) | 6+8 (H-Series) 2+8 (U-Series) | 6+8 (H-Series) 2+8 (U-Series) | 6+8 (H-Series) 8+16 (HX-Series) | 6+8 (H-Series) 8+8 (HX-Series) |
| Max Cores / Threads | 16/16 | 8/8 | 14/14 | 14/20 | 14/20 | 14/20 |
| AI NPU | NPU5 (50 TOPS) | NPU4 (48 TOPS) | NPU3.5 (13 TOPS) | NPU3 (11 TOPS) | NPU2 (7 TOPS) | NPU2 (7 TOPS) |
| Planned Lineup | Core Ultra 300 | Core Ultra 200V | Core Ultra 200 | Core Ultra 100 | 14th/13th Gen | 12th Gen |
| GPU Architecture | Xe3-LPG (Battlemage) | Xe2-LPG (Battlemage) | Xe-LPG+ (Alchemist) | Xe-LPG (Alchemist) | Iris Xe (Gen 12) | Iris Xe (Gen 12) |
| Xe Cores (Max) | 12 Xe3 Cores | 8 Xe2 Cores | 8 Xe Cores | 8 Xe Cores | 96 EUs (768 Cores) | 96 EUs (768 Cores) |
| Memory Support | LPDDR5X-9600 | LPDDR5X-8533 | DDR5-5600 LPDDR5-7500 LPDDR5X-8533 | DDR5-5600 LPDDR5-7400 LPDDR5X - 7400+ | DDR5-5200 LPDDR5-5200 LPDDR5-6400 | DDR5-4800 LPDDR5-5200 LPDDR5X-4267 |
| Memory Capacity (Max) | 128 GB | 32 GB | 128 GB | 96 GB | 64 GB | 64 GB |
| Thunderbolt Support | TB5 | TB5 | TB5 | TB4 | TB4 | TB4 |
| WiFi Capability | WiFi 7 | WiFi 7 | WiFi 7 | WiFi 6E | WiFi 6E | WiFi 6E |
| TDP | 17-45W | 17-30W | TBD | 7W-45W | 15-55W | 15-55W |
| Launch | 2H 2025 | 2H 2024 | 2H 2024 | 2H 2023 | 1H 2023 | 1H 2022 |
About the author: A Software Engineer by training and a PC enthusiast by passion, Hassan Mujtaba serves as Wccftech's Senior Editor for hardware section. With years of experience in the industry, he specializes in deep-dive technical analysis of next-generation CPU and GPU architectures, motherboards, and cooling solutions. His work involves not only breaking news on upcoming technologies but also extensive hands-on reviews and benchmarking.
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